Secrets
by acertainaddict
Summary: Adele pretends to be soemthing she isn't....and someone is catching on to her lies. But can she catch on to theirs? And who can she trust, anyway? certainly not the boy who is trying so hard to 'ferret' her out...DHr
1. Chapter 1

**Secrets**

A/N: So I combined this chapter with chapter two and rewrote the bottom...hopefully it's better now...let me know? aka, review? please?

**_Chapter One: The First Chapter_**

A bird flew down a dark alleyway, cawing loudly. Rats scuttled for a safe place to hide inside of one of the many dumpsters lining the back of the shops – which had closed several hours ago. The alley was suddenly very quiet and seemed to grow even darker. There were no shadows – there was no light to make them. The night seemed to be one never-ending shadow. The stars were not even visible. There was no moon.

Suddenly, the cry of a baby broke the ominous silence, a loud, healthy cry. There was a soft but panicked shushing, a mother, trying to keep her precious baby quiet. "Quiet, baby, we must keep quiet," she urged in a pressing voice.

The scuttling of rats broke her plea, and her head jerked up at once. A quick movement had frightened the rats, giving her warning. The woman disappeared with a swish of her robes and a soft pop. Only that evil presence remained; the night seemed darker than ever.

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An alarm clock rang and a hand reached up from under a down comforter and whacked it. It stopped ringing and the hand retreated back under the covers.

Five minutes later, the clock rang again. The hand reemerged and moved to hit the clock again. This time it missed – and sent the alarm clock flying across the room, still ringing.

"Damn it! Can't I get any sleep anymore? I swear the entire universe is against me getting any sleep." The girl picked up the alarm clock and started banging it on the table. The clock was broken and this was the only way to effectively turn it off. Adele wasn't in a good mood anyway, and the hitting the clock was a good stress-reliever. "First the summer homework, then the evil time that the train leaves. Who knows what's next? Why can't the train leave in the afternoon anyway? Then we could have hot coco and then go to sleep and then wake up at Hogwarts. Why does it have to leave in the morning? I hate my life. Erhhhh!"

Of course, Adele Mathinee completely ignored the fact that she had had the entire summer to do the school homework, not just last night – or until about five that morning. It was now six o'clock and she had 20 minutes to get dressed and eat before she had to leave to get on the Hogwarts Express.

"And I want a boyfriend!"

With that, Adele started throwing clothes from various drawers into her school trunk, pulling out a long white v-neck shirt and a pair of jeans. The shirt had shiny white buttons running down one side of the collar. She liked it. Especially because it had long sleeves which were way too long.

She grabbed a pair of sandals and headed into her bathroom. She quickly got dressed, pulling back her hair, and smudging some makeup onto her eyes, and adding some mascara. She looked in the mirror, posed, and then ran out back into her bedroom.

Ten minutes left.

"Adele, are you up yet?" A voice shouted. "Yeah!" She screamed back. "That's only like the tenth time they've checked. Honestly, like I would not get up on time," She muttered stormily. Just happening to forget that she had ignored them the first nine times they had called her. And that she did tend to sleep in a lot. But, if they actually got her up on time, as she would argue, then she would get up – she just ignored them because she didn't need to be up when they called her and then she would fall back asleep and thus not wake up when she was supposed to. If they would just agree to get her up at a reasonable time, life would be so much easier. But they had to do things their way. Grrr. Thus, she was considered to be the one who always slept in.

Adele grabbed her newly-finished homework, scribbled her name across the top using her new permanently-pre-inked quill, slid the papers into one of her books, and threw the mess into her trunk. She then ran back into the bathroom, grabbed a small bag, threw in the makeup she had left out as well as anything else on her counter, closed the bag, grabbed a small tin of jewelry, and ran back into her room. She added that to the trunk.

She sprayed herself with some perfume, wrapped the bottle in a shirt that she found on the floor, and added that to the trunk as well. Then she grabbed an bohemian purse-bag-thing off a shelf, and threw in her ipod. Then she frantically ran around her room, searching for her money bag for about three minutes. She finally found it under a blanket on her bed – her bed was a mass of blankets and pillows, strewn haphazardly over a mattress – threw that in the purse with her wand, and, dragging her trunk, walked out the door of her bedroom.

Three minutes left.

Adele ran down to the kitchen and announced "Morning! Ready to go?" in a cheerful voice.

"Here, you have to eat something before we leave," her mom said, handing her a plate of eggs and tomatoes. Adele thanked her and ate the food quickly at the kitchen counter, while her father greeted her and then started moving her trunk out toward the garage where he would put it in the car.

Adele waved at him and smiled, still stuffing eggs and an occasional tomato into her mouth. She finally finished and walked over to the sink, washing the plate. She added it to the dishwasher, looked to her mother and said, "You ready to go?"

"Just let me get my things" she replied, walking back up the stairs. She returned a minute later with her jacket, and picked up her purse from the kitchen counter and headed out to join Adele in the garage.

Adele's father was just getting into the driver seat, Adele was in the back seat, and her mother climbed into the passenger side. The father turned the key, and as soon as the engine flared to life, the Mathinees left their home.

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About an hour and a half later, Adele was walking toward the Hogwarts express, rolling her trunk behind her on a trolley. She had said a final goodbye to her parents. Goodbyes were terrible things – they always made her feel so guilty. Usually people started crying and describing how much they would miss the other person. She always tried to look sad and tell the person how she was sad to see them go – but she never felt particularly sad to be leaving the person behind.

And especially where her parents were concerned, this made Adele fell awful. They had raised her! How could she not miss them? But she didn't, so she just ignored it until people brought up how much they missed other people. Oh well.

She was happy to see people again though. Maybe her feelings of missing people were overcome by her excitement to see other people again? And here she was.

Almost immediately, Adele saw the happy face of her best friend Carlye. They both started screaming and people looked at them strangely. The girls were used to it. Between the excited screams of the pair, "Oh my gosh how are you?" "How was your summer?" and "I missed you so much!" could be heard, but then the girls just started screaming again and whatever they might have been saying was completely unrecognizable.

After a while, the two calmed down enough to actually talk, and, after a few minutes, to start taking their luggage into the train. They spent the ride up to the school talking about their summers, and occasionally screaming again – they _had_ been apart the entire summer.

"I pretty much sat around doing nothing except reading fanfict-er my new _potions_ book," Adele decided. "It was pathetic."

"Hey, I wasn't any better –did you read those newBlaiseHermionestories? It took me so long to catch up on all of them.I didn't even do homework. Which reminds me," Carlye stopped fingering her green and gray striped Slytherin scarf and pulled out a few sheets of parchment and started writing. She had been born into a pureblood family as old as the Malfoy's – their two families had actually been traditionally close friends, which was lucky for Carlye because Draco was often called "the Slytherin Prince," which meant that Carlye was well-respected among the Slytherins, no matter how strange she acted sometimes. Draco was like a close cousin to her

Adele pulled out her own unfinished homework but was soon distracted by the passing scenery. Well,not distracted exactly- her homework wasn't the most excitingthing in the world and she could only look at it for so long.There were long green fields and trees far off in the distance. The sun was just above those trees, shining across their tops, making them glisten, showing off their lovely fall shades of red, green, and yellow. The surrounding sky was grayish blue andentirely cloudless. "So beautiful," she thought to herself. Just then, the compartment door slammed, causing her to jump.

She turned around to see Draco Malfoy enter their compartment. "Did I startle you?" He asked in a very obviouslysarcastic voice.

"Shut up Draco, I'm trying to finish my homework before we get to school." Carlye snapped.

"So sorry, my dear cousin, I forgot how dreadfully incompetent you are when it comes to your studies. Apparently all summer wasn't enough time for you to finish your work? You spend all night and day during the summer and now continue to work? Honestly, sometimes you remind me of Granger," he sneered, pulling out his potions book and a roll of parchment.

"You should talk." Adele remarked in an taunting voice. Carlye just glared at both of them. Draco sat down and made himself at home in their compartment. Carlye got back to work.

"So…" Adele said, in a tone that clearly meant, "What the hell are you doing in here?"

"So I was wondering why I never saw you this summer." Draco replied in an equally hostile voice. "I must have seen Mr. and Mrs. Tougoura at least four times at ministry parties and I never saw you with them. And when I finally asked them where you might be, they claimed that they did not have a daughter named Adele, but rather, a son, named Hubert, who was studying abroad at Beauxbatons, the school at which they had been taught magic." Carlye looked up sharply with a strange expression on her face.

Adele's eyes had widened for a quick second, but she covered it with a loud laugh. "And you fell for that?" She laughed some more. "My parents have a reputation for playing tricks on unsuspecting people. Poor Draco, did no one let you in on the joke?"

Draco gave her an angry look and replied, "And they just happened to have pictures of some random boy with them that they forced me to look at for an hour, all the while talking about his accomplishments at the school?" his tone was very skeptical.

Adele laughed even louder. "That was probably my cousin they showed you – he actually is studying at Beauxbatons right now – he was raised over there but his parents and mine are still very close. They love to tell my parents all about him. Personally, I think he's a total jerk. I met him once and he could barely speak English. I had to speak to him in French the entire time, while he made fun of my bad accent."

"The Hubert that I met at the end of this summer spoke flawless English," Draco replied simply.

Adele looked nonchalant as she replied, "That's because this summer his parents made him take lessons from me. I'm surprised that he actually went along with their joke though, usually heruins any type of joke. He's a sick kid."

Draco gave her a look, "Really, he seemed like an okay guy to me, with his shining blue eyes and blond hair. Perfect English schoolboy, really. A bit dull though, but he must be a genius to have mastered the entire English language in two weeks."

Adele sniffed. "Trust me, 'dull' doesn't even begin to describe my cousin."

Draco smirked."If you say so."

"WOULD you two just STOP flirting for ONE second so that I can finish my work. I have like three essay's here!" Carlye screamed.

They all returned to working on their homework for an hour or so until Draco finally broke the silence."Well, I have to go meet up with Blaise. I guess I'll see you two girls later."

He got up and walked to the door and began to walk out. He leaned back through the door at the last minute, smiling cheerily. "Adele, I'm onto you, my sweet." He turned and walked out through the door.

A/N: Just a friendly reminder to REVIEW DAMN YOU!

thanks!


	2. Chapter 2

**Secrets:**

A/N: this was up before but i re-wrotea lot of it...hopefully it's slightly better now?

**_Chapter 2: In which creepy things happen.._**

"So tell me, what was that about?" Carlye asked.

"What was what about?" Adele replied innocently.

"You spent all summer reading DHr didn't you? Not just regular fanfiction. DHr."

"Maybe? I mean no? Yeah..." Adele said in a far-off voice.

"And what's this whole Tougoura thing that is making my darling friend Draco suspicious?"

"I have no idea. I always told you he reads into things too much. My cousin's just smart and my family is a little strange.."

"Ah yes, sticking to your story like a true Slytherin. Listen, I know you, and I know you when you have to think fast. Your lip goes all funny when you do. So tell me what's going on and I'll helpthrow Draco offyour track, mmmkay?" Carlye said in a rather annoyingly superior voice – a voice which she knew would make Adele rather angry.

Finally, Adele sighed, "Fine, I'll tell you but you are promising me right now that none of this leaves this compartment, alright?" She moved to perform a silencing spell.

"So…" Carlye began when Adele had finished, "You came out to your parents about our lesbian excursions and they kicked you out of the house, did they?" The joke broke the tension and both girls laughed for a while before Adele finally began her story.

"Well, I know that I'm adopted, and I could be a daughter of the Tougouras for all I know. I was raised by two muggles, more commonly known as the Mathinees. They found me when I was two years old crawling around their living room. And I've lived with them ever since." Adele stated quickly with an almost ironic quality to her voice.

"I knew it!" Carlye practically shouted looking very pleased with herself. She jumped up and started doing a short victory dance, during which Adele simply stared at her friend with a smirk on her face until the girl sat back down.

"Well, not the part about you being adopted. But on the first day of school you seemed rather…different. I don't know. But – wow – you definitely picked up on things quickly for someone from a muggle background."

"I learned from the best," Adele smiled sweetly as Carlye smiled back proudly.

"Draco Malfoy." Carlye pouted and threw a pillow which previously had decorated her seat, at Adele, laughing.

"So do you know anything about your birth parents?" Carlye ventured.

"I have no real idea. I don't even know if they were wizards. I had a ring though when they found me – I always wear it around my neck."

"Can I see it then," Carlye asked eagerly.

In answer, Adele unhooked a long bronze chain from around her neck and handed the chain to her friend, the ring softlyreflecting the dim cabin's light.

"It doesn't fit me anymore, it's too small," Adele said sadly as Carlye studied the ring as it dangled from its chain with a curious expression on her face. "You should try it on."

"No, I can tell it won't fit." Carlye stated.

"No, try it on anyway, you never know," Adele persisted.

"Well it's your only family heirloom and I'd feel as though I was intruding somehow." Carlye handed the ring, bouncing on its chain, back to Adele, who took it and fastened it back around her neck.

"So what did you think about it – does it remind you of any old wizarding families or am I to be stuck with muggles forever?"

"I think you're going to be stuck with the muggles," Carlye laughed almost uneasily, and promptly changed the subject to ways in which to re-convince Draco of Adele's relation to the Tougouras.

_Great_, Adele thought. Now Carlye was going to be distant with her, albeit subtly, until she had come to terms about Adele's possible muggle heritage. After all, Carlye's family was not exactly, shall we say, muggle-friendly? Was it really fair for Carlye to risk her family's favor in order to be a friend to her? Things were so much simpler when Carlye had been left in the dark. 'Perhaps things are better kept that way, as secrets' Adele thought to herself.

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When the students finally arrived at Hogwarts, they were tired and hungry. Adele and Carlye walked over to their Slytherin table and sat down. There was hardly anyone else at the table yet; just a small group of girls sitting at the end of the table, giggling away. Carlye huffed very noticeably— the girls were too far away to notice. Adele, however, looked over at her and whispered, "One of the various things which makes me dread returning to school— Pansy Parkinson and company. At least they aren't sitting by us."

Carlye smiled for a second but then replied, "For now they aren't, but we need to do something about them this year. I can't take another year of having to pretend to care about everything that comes out of her mouth." Her expression changed and she began to laugh. "Maybe if you went out with Draco, Pansy would stop talking to us out of sheer hatred."

Of course Draco happened to walk up to the laughing girls just as she said this. He sat down next to them, smirking. "So desperate for a date with me, Adele, that you force my cousin to make up bad excuses? I don't do sympathy dating. But I won't hold it against you. I get that kind of thing every day."

"Yeah, that's right, I heard you only date girls who pity you because you're so ugly. There must be a lot of them." Adele replied.

"Ugly, am I?" Draco repeated slowly, fixing Adele with a simmering stare. Recognizing this for a challenge (and Adele was never one to turn down a challenge) she bit her lip and said, moving herself onto his lap, "Well, I guess you're not so bad. But I'd need to get the overall picture to judge for sure." She began to unbutton his shirt, straddling him.

Meanwhile, Blaise, Draco's best friend, sat down where Adele had been sitting. He looked at the pair for a second, then turned to Carlye and drawled, "Bored?"

She breathlessly replied, "You have no idea," and jumped onto his lap, where they began to make out. Next to them, Draco and Adele were still seeing how far the other would go on this sort of dare they had gotten themselves into. There was a crash as Draco stood up, pushing Adele onto the dinner table, shoving aside plates and silverware. They then began to make out too.

Draco was really turned on by this new side of Adele. She had always been one to joke around about completely random make out sessions, but he hadn't thought that she would ever actually go through with it. He laughed to himself. He didn't particularly mind this new side of her. He felt her arms wrapped tightly around his back, pulling him closer. Then one grabbed his butt and began to move around to the front of his pants. He looked at her shocked that she would be so aggressive, especially in the middle of the great hall. He was enjoying the feel of her hand, now slowly moving down his stomach and into his pants. He suddenly realized something.

Her two arms were wrapped around his _back_. He pulled back from Adele suddenly. He hit someone behind him and turned around, "What the HELL?" he shouted. Next to him, Carlye climbed off of Blaise and, sitting back down in her seat, looked up to watch the scene. She and Blaise had identical grins on their faces.

Behind Draco was a black-haired boy with a pair of glasses covering brilliantly green eyes, and a scar on his forehead was obscured only by his tousled hair. He appeared badly out of breath.

Harry Potter quickly removed his hand from down Draco's pants. He looked startled. "Oh— s-sorry, I thought you were someone else." He quickly turned and walked away. Draco stared, open-mouthed, as Harry went back across the great hall to sit down at the Gryffindor table. Once there, Ron, Lavender, Ginny, - well, pretty much the entire house of Gryffindor- started laughing.

"I guess it was some sort of dare." Draco heard from behind him. He quickly turned to Adele, replying, "Well, that was some really twisted shit."

A/N: Okay so Chapter Two….yay!

So I'm beginning to see where this is going. Vaguely. Fine, very vaguely. But I did get to do some setting up of future events in this chapter. Heh.

Oh. And this was originally a DHr story. As that is where my loyalties lie. But, Hermione would be so out of character I though that I should just make her into a new person entirely. Fine. Adele is essentially me. But that will change. Adele will (and already does) have her own twists and etc. and I'm going to shut up as I seriously doubt many people read these author notes anyway. I never do. So I cannot blame you for following in my own, noble footsteps. :smirk:

I would appreciate Reviews though. Seriously, flame me. I probably need to hear it. Okay, I would also appreciate nice reviews though. I feel like I'm writing a wish list to Santa Claus with all these specifications.

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE REVIEW! I'd say I would love you forever if you did, but that really isn't true. Still, I would be really really grateful and update faster...or if you don't like the story, i could take it down faster...

BUT I WON"T KNOW UNLESS YOU REVIEW, WILL I?

bottom line review. please. i'm desperate.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3:

**A Fun Little Game:**

That night, when they were alone in their seventh-year dormitory (Pansy and her friends had gone down to the common room), Adele rounded on Carlye.

"Okay, tell me already. I know you and Blaise had something to do with Harry's completely random molestation of Draco."

Carlye didn't even pretend to look ashamed. "Step one to distracting Draco from your heritage: freak him out. That time I told you I was going to the bathroom, I ran into Blaise in front of Harry's compartment. I had a flash of brilliance and Blaise…well, you know how Blaise is. And the compartment was completely full of Gryffindors. Harry can't turn down a dare in front of his friends. Bloody Gryffindors"

Adele laughed, "Oh the joys of being in Slytherin."

Just then, Pansy and her friends decided to walk into the dorm. "Hey girls, we're all going to play truth or dare downstairs, wanna come?" (A/N: I know, so cliché.)

"Sure," Carlye replied for both of them.

"We're changing into our pajamas first though, just in case we get so drunk we pass out." Pansy's sidekick Timea joked. But everyone knew she was serious.

The girls all laughed and changed into their very Slytherin pajamas. In other words, all of them were wearing some form of grey and green. Who wouldn't love those colors?

Then they all walked downstairs together. Waiting in the common room were the guys, lounging around on all of the sofas and chairs- taking up any possibly comfortable sitting space. Of course, the first thing Adele did was to conjure ice water which dropped onto each of the guys. They jumped up in shock- well, all except for Draco and Blaise who had managed to keep the water off of themselves, remaining dry and retaining their seats. Pansy charmed the vacated seats dry and sat back with the guys who had previously been sprawled out on the cushions, but were now sitting up like gentlemen, with meek expressions on their faces.

"That's better," stated Carlye. "But as for you two," she turned to Draco and Blaise, who were each spread out on their own small sofas, "Move." Blaise was staring up into space, apparently oblivious to her, and Draco had his hands folded under his head as he leaned back on a cushion, staring at Adele with a smug expression.

"Or what, you'll try to remove me again?" Draco challenged.

This time, Adele spoke. "Maybe I can't remove you with spells Draco, but I do know a few _charms_." She walked across the room, and then leaned down to kiss him, slowly moving herself onto the couch. As soon as she had managed to lie down next to him for a minute, Draco pushed her off the couch and she crashed gracelessly onto the floor.

"I think that was one of the worst pick-up lines I have ever heard. And that's saying something." Draco remarked, by way of explanation.

"It's probably the _only_ pick-up line you have ever heard." Adele retorted from the floor, scowling and rubbing her back.

Draco laughed and pulled her back up onto the couch with him, draping his arm around her shoulders. Adele pushed him off her and moved to the other side of the couch, still scowling. Draco offered her a Butterbeer as a gift of consolation.

Carlye had simply lain down on top of Blaise, curling up on his chest. He, being more of a gentleman than Draco, simply sat up, pulling her with him and wrapping his arm around Carlye's shoulders, much like Draco had attempted to do with Adele. Carlye, however, let him keep his arm around her.

"So," Pansy began, glaring slightly at Adele, "Now, after that _intriguing _display, shall we begin our game?"

"Yes, let's," Carlye responded, blinking her eyes in a way to emphasize the falsity of her enthusiasm.

Blaise gave Carlye a slightly reprimanding look and then asked, "What are we playing again? Truth or dare?"

Draco grinned and said, "Sounds good to me, but let's step it up a level. I read about this charm over the summer which will force you to tell the truth for about two hours. It's not like a simple truth spell though. First the questioner has to ask whoever he's asking if they agree to answer the question, and then the spell will work if the person agrees, only for that one question. I haven't had a chance to try it out yet."

Adele exchanged a nervous look with Carlye at the end of Draco's statement. Carlye mouthed, "Just choose 'dare'" from behind Draco. Adele nodded almost imperceptibly. When she looked back at Draco though, he was looking at her with a smile that told her that he was definitely going to find out about her family if given the chance, and that he had a very good idea of what she was nodding at.

"It's easy enough to find out if someone follows through with a dare," Draco continued.

Everyone nodded to him, and Draco proceeded to perform the charm on each of them. Adele slyly reminded him not to forget to charm himself. He glared at her for a moment, but then had no choice but to go ahead and allow her to perform the same charm on him. (Adele was a quick learner).

"So first to see if it works," Carlye began, looking over to Pansy's friend Timea. "Do you agree to answer my question?"

"Yes."

"Okay then, if you could date any boy you wanted, who would it be?" Timea gave her an angry look and tried to speak, but her voice wouldn't work. She tried again.

Carlye grinned. "Repeat after me, Neville Longbottom." Timea shook her head at her. Blaise took a turn, "What, you can't say anything else so you might as well try to say it."

"Neville Longbottom," came out in an embarrassed whisper. "Fine then," Timea said in a louder voice. "My turn, Carlye. Do you agree to answer my question?"

"If I have to."

"You do. Same question. If you could date any boy, who would it be?"

Carlye smiled at her and turned to Blaise. "Blaise Zabini." The chosen one pecked her on the lips with his man-beak. (A/N: wtf?)

"I guess it's my turn now." Blaise looked around. "Draco," he said slowly. "Do you agree to answer my question?"

Draco gave him a meaningful look before answering, "Yes, I do."

"Okay then," Blaise began, rubbing his hands together happily. "My one chance to ruin Draco's reputation for good. Did you enjoy Harry's hand down your pants?"

Draco glared at him furiously. "Yes, I did, okay! I thought it was Adele, so lay off."

Adele grabbed a pillow from the couch, and disappeared into it, giggling uncontrollably. Everyone else was laughing too, but it was to her that Draco then directed his attention.

"Since you seem to find that so funny, Adele, you can answer the next question. Do you agree to answer? It was more of a challenge than a question.

It took Adele a minute to pry her face out of the pillow, and another before her voice was calm enough to answer him. "Actually, I think we've had enough truth for one night, I choose a dare."

Draco smirked at her. "Why, is there something you're hiding? You like lesbian porn? Because I think everyone in this room already knows that." Everyone in the room was laughing at her. Draco went on, "will you at least answer that question?"

"Fine. I do not enjoy looking at lesbian porn."

"Oh but Adele, that was not the question which I intend for you to answer now that you have so kindly agreed to answer a question of mine."

Adele gave him an infuriated but defiant stare.

"So, Adele," Draco smirked, "I ask: are you are a daughter of the Tougoura family?"

Adele felt blood rush to her face as she fought to keep down the developing blush. "No. Not that I am aware of, I was adopted when I was a baby."

"As I thought. I've always had good instincts." Draco remarked arrogantly, still staring into Adele's glaring face. Carlye gave her a comforting look over her shoulder with a smile of praise that she hadn't, thankfully, revealed that she had been raised by muggles.

The game wrapped up after about an hour, and the Slytherins returned to their house dormitories, Adele still furious with Draco.

A/N: Okay, so I wanted to keep writing this chapter but my mother is literally screaming at me to get in the car…we're going to pick up our PUPPY today! (my dad is bringing him home on the plane from Canada….

REVIEW PLEASE! (I'll update/make changes/ take down my story FASTER that way!)


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Yet another cheesy opening, but you might get over it. I was re-reading the first few chapters, and I don't think it's quite as overly dramatic. **

**Chapter 4:**

Thin and worn scraps of cloth spun wildly in the wind, wrapping themselves tightly around a thin body. Long hair was hardly distinguishable from the cloth—but the colors made a difference clear. The woman in the midst of the flapping violence was a shade of ivory, a stark contrast to the deep blue of the cloth and the messy gold, brown, and blue of the hair. Adele became fascinated with one particularly long strip of cloth, and she stared at it, entranced by its dance, until it suddenly elongated into the wind. Suddenly, Adele couldn't tell where the strip ended. The woman followed the strip into airy infinity and out of sight.

Adele looked down and saw the same strips of cloth clinging to her body—one was already straining for nothingness, and she was tempted by the beating winds to slip away with it.

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Blinking the traces of last night's dream from her eyes, Adele tried to focus as Carlye repeated herself for the third time.

"He's not at breakfast." Adele assumed Carlye meant Draco. And she could only thank the morning that he had chosen not to show up to further bother her. Also, she hoped that he would be late for class, because they had Potions first thing this morning. Maybe Snape would be in a bad mood. She would hope. Fervently.

"Thank goodness" Adele replied, helping herself to another slice of sourdough toast from the center of the table. "We need to come up with some sort of story though, because if I know Draco, I know that he will not give up until he is completely satisfied." Carlye commented.

"Let's hope that's purely a second-hand observation, dear." Adele said rather sarcastically. "But you're right. We need to tell him something.. Any ideas?"

"Well, we could just stick with the classic, your parents wish to keep themselves unknown—although they surrendered you to a random family in order to keep you from the Dark Lord. But unfortunately, you ended up in Slytherin so it was all for nothing on their part. But that story will only distract him for a short while—he'll want to know the details. And your real family."

"So then you think the best idea would be to discover the truth? And then we'll figure out what to tell him?" Adele asked.

"Probably…you should write to your parents. Adopted parents. Just to see if there are any other details."

"Alright." Adele said in a low tone. Carlye' eyes seemed distant. She couldn't help but wonder if there was something Carlye was not telling her—she hadn't mentioned researching the ring, and it wasn't like her to forget details. And she did get quiet on the train seeing the ring. But then, maybe Carlye was just tired.

She looked up suddenly, and saw that the room was nearly empty. "Carlye, we're going to be late!"

The two girls jumped up and walked at a brisk pace toward the potions dungeon. (Slytherins never ran. Obviously. They had a thing called dignity.)

Dun. Dun. Dun.

"Wow! If it isn't my two favorite potions students!" Snape drawled with a malicious tongue as they entered his class several minutes late. "Fortunately, Blaise and Draco can pick up for some of their – deficient – housemates. Adele! Sit with Draco! Carlye, Blaise."

Of course Snape wasn't entirely loving toward his late students, but this was a form of favoritism, because he had intentionally paired their little foursome together, even though Adele wasn't particularly thrilled by Draco on this morning.

"Today," Snape began. "We will have a sort of _friendly_ competition between partners. I sincerely hope that you all did your summer reading, because otherwise you will suffer most painfully when you taste your own Mendaecis potion. The losing partners will write an essay about why exactly their potion failed, and why they are inferior to their partners."

Adele was very lucky; she had just read up on this potion on the train to school the day before. It was a very tricky and delicate potion. But she had dealt with worse potions before. She was looking forward to seeing Snape force one of the Gryffindors to take the potion—a potion that would cause a person to be entirely pessimistic/ fatalistic for up to three hours. The potion had a bad reputation for the numbers of people who had committed suicide because they were unwittingly under its influence.

She had to compete with Draco, potions king. Just. Lovely. But her potions skills rivaled his, although admittedly he could top her in a pinch. She would really need to focus.

Snape stood at the front of the room, a dark and tense figure. "You may begin."

Students rushed to the supply cupboard, but Adele and Draco remained behind. "Accio sage. Accio ant-eater talon. Accio…" They had all their supplies within seconds. Adele lit a fire under her cauldron and filled it with hot water from her wand. She grabbed a large ginger root and began to slice it according to the potions book that lay open in front of her. When she had the right quantity, she looked at her thin slices in admiration. Absolutely beautiful. She had about thirty seconds before she was to add them to the potion, one slice, then two slices ten seconds later, then on more slice thirty seconds later and so on….She glanced over at Draco, who was leaning over his potion, stirring it gently with the far-off look he always had on his face when he was wrapped up in doing something he liked. Perfect, she thought. Reaching under her robes for her wand, she managed to surreptitiously point the thing at Draco. Hah. Payback time.

_Confundius!_ She mentally threw at him—no one was stupid enough to whisper curses at Draco. He had ears like a cat, and you did not want to get him angry. This curse was subtle. Not as strong as Confundus—it only caused a person to become slightly more clumsy and a bit slower for about 5 minutes. And that was all Draco needed—to lose his dragon's grace for 5 crucial minutes. Success!

She added her ginger root slices, before cutting the sage into small triangular shapes and adding those to the now boiling water….in short, she followed the instructions beautifully.

After adding the last bit of powdered snake eggshells, Adele sat back with a sigh. Her potion would be perfect. And she was ahead of Draco, who was finishing grinding the shells. He threw her an innocent glance every now and then—trying to look as though he was intentionally slower than she was with the potion. She watched his confident hand rolling the pedestal around in its stone bowl, slowly but forcefully. She watched him measure out the correct amount of the powder to tip into the cauldron. Ever so slowly brushing each little bit into the bowl. She hated how the little git wouldn't just accept that she had defeated him. No, it had to be according to his "plan." It was rather amusing to know that she was the reason for his slowness. But he would never admit to clumsiness, so she would never have a chance to gloat.

But she wouldn't be stupid enough to gloat to his face. She'd really regret it.

"Very well done, Miss Mathinee. The clear winner." Said a slippery voice from right behind her. She restrained herself from jumping in shock. Snape loved to do this to his students. She knew it would frustrate him to know he hadn't managed to surprise her. Snape moved past her with a brush of his cloak. "Draco, a bit slower than usual today, aren't you? I hope you didn't catch something from one of the other students."

Draco glared at the back of Snape's head, refusing to look at Adele. She ignored him for a while, gloating at her beautifully contrived win. She moved over to Draco after a minute. "Are you alright Draco? Snape was right—you do seem a bit slow today. Maybe you should go sleep after class. Miss Charms if you have to."

"You're probably right, Adele. I have been feeling tired this morning." Draco admitted, looking over at her. "Will you tell Flittwick for me?"

"Of course, Draco." Adele responded kindly. "It's not a problem at all."

As soon as they had stepped out of the room, Carlye was laughing at Adele like a madwoman. "I knew you two would do this. The 'let's be extremely polite and pretend like nothing happened so that we can secretly try to kill each other in peace.' This is going to be so much fun to watch!"

"Thanks, Carlye."

"So is he really sick? Or did you do something? You did something didn't you!" Adele looked at Carlye with an expressionless face. "You did? You sly little rabbit you! You're going to be dead by the end of this week, you realize."

"I don't think he realized. And he didn't act like he had realized afterward. I'm pretty good at picking up on those things. He was just being his usual polite ass self."

"A lovely word combination."

"Thanks."

Charms was a large class of Slytherin and Ravenclaw students.Today they learned how to bewitch instruments so that they would play on their own. "Unfortunately, the instruments can only play music that the spell-caster knows well. They cannot create music and they cannot play music you have only heard once or twice—Remember, the spell is only as strong as your memory of a particular song is!"

Adele tried out the charm with the song "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star," and she had her guitar playing the song with a piano accompaniment by the end of class.

Then she and Carlye left together for lunch.

**Feel Free to review. and i might Feel Free to update. if you like the story. I'll probably keep writing it anyway, because writing is extremely amusing for me. I just don't know how well that translates into what i have written here... any suggestions, or anything that's extremely annoying-- let me know. I might just fix it.  
**


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